Licensed Practical Nurse - Long Term Care

Licensed Practical Nurse - Long Term Care

Department: Northwest Territories Health and Social Services Authority

This job opening is limited to residents living within 25 kilometres of Inuvik.

Department Information

The Northwest Territories Health and Social Services Authority (NTHSSA) offers challenging and exciting careers in health and social services delivery and administration in Canada’s North. The Territorial Authority has service locations in communities across the territory and a staff of more than 1,600 serving over 43,000 residents of the NWT and 5,900 residents of the Kitikmeot Region of Nunavut. Challenging work, welcoming communities, and expanded opportunities are some of the benefits offered to employees of the NTHSSA.

Job Information

The Inuvik Regional Hospital (IRH) is a 51 in-patient bed accredited facility, 7 Community Health Centers, and 17 other sites, including social services and dental therapy offices, public health clinics, elder’s facilities, and various group homes. There are approximately 7,500 residents in the Beaufort Delta region. The NTHSSA provides and supports the delivery of health care services to adults and children on an inpatient, outpatient, and outreach basis in order to enhance healthy community well-being through excellence, accountability and respect for regional diversity.

Located within the IRH, and reporting directly to the Supervisor, Long Term Care, the Licensed Practical Nurse (LPN) provides culturally sensitive care to residents in the 25-bed (3 of these beds are for respite care) Long Term Care unit with Registered Nurses (RNs) and Personal Support Workers. During the weekday shift, there is a Team Leader RN on duty. Outside of these hours, the LPN in Long Term Care will be in charge and is accountable for the overall nursing care of all patients within the unit. Every LPN in Long Term Care may be required to act as the Responsibility Nurse when working nights or weekends.

The LPN in Long Term Care is a member of a multidisciplinary team who: determine resident status at weekly team meetings; respond to actual or potential health problems; plan and perform interventions; and evaluate resident outcomes with the intention of maintaining or regaining client health. Patients are admitted to the facility for a variety of reasons and generally have common well-defined needs. These residents are long-term convalescent, geriatric, respite, and/or cognitively impaired residents or palliative care patients. Residents within the Unit are visited a minimum of once per week or more frequently as required by their physician. As a result, the LPN may be called on to make independent day-to-day decisions regarding individual nursing care plans based on written medical orders verified by an RN on duty.

Typically, the above qualifications would be attained by:
This level of knowledge is commonly acquired through the successful completion of a Licensed Practical Nursing Certificate and two years recent experience within a long-term care setting.